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2021 test match rugby will conclude for the Americas on Friday. The final fixture for the year sees Chile playing away from home against Russia. The match is the second of a two-match-series. Game one went the way of the South Americans; Los Cóndores made a stunning comeback to beat Russia 30-29. Friday’s match now gives Los Cóndores a chance to end a special year in the best way possible.
Russia Head Coach Lyn Jones has a team preparing for further RWC qualifiers and won experiencing transitions. Veteran Yuri Kushnarev will play for the Bears for the final time. The fly half played six test matches for Russia across Rugby World Cups 2011 and 2019.
Russia will be without six players who are back with their clubs. The Enisey-STM and Lokomotiv-Penza club players Ramil Gaisin, Konstantin Uzunov, Viktor Kononov, Andrey Karzanov, Daniil Potikhanov and German Silenk will not play against Los Cóndores on Friday.
The roster sees the inclusion of newcomers. They come in the form of Kirill Panarin (VVA-Podmoskovye) at flanker, Viktor Telnov (Lokomotiv-Penza) on the left wing and Gleb Farkov (Dínamo) at fullback. Replacement forward Bogdan Kireev (Lokomotiv-Penza) is also uncapped.
Chile have a side fraturing six changes from game one. Up front Vittorio Lastra replaces Javier Carrasco at loose head prop. Lastra will join Tomás Dussaillant and Matías Dittus in an opposing front-row. A confident Pablo Lemoine replaces Augusto Sarmiento, and Javier Eissmann with the second-row partnership of Clemente Saavedra, and Augusto Sarmiento. N8 sees Alfonso Escobar recalled in palce of Raimundo Martínez.
The backline sees two changes. First, Nicolás Herreros makes way for Marcelo Torrealba at scrum-half. Second, Matías Garafulic moves from inside center to the right wing. He replaces his brother, Matías Garafulic while veteran José Larenas starts at inside center.
Chile’s side is packed with players from the RWC 2023 qualifiers; there is no shortage of names who featured in the heroic win over Canada. The team is now preparing for 2022. Chile will face the USA in home-and-away fixtures in July. The winner will qualify for RWC 2023 as Americas 2.
RUSSIA
1 Alexey Skobiola, 2 Dmitry Parkhomenko, 3 Vladimir Podrezov, 4 Alexander Ilin, 5 Egor Zykov, 6 Vitali Zhivatov (capt.), 7 Kirill Panarin, 8 Nikita Vavilin, 9 Stepan Khokhlov, 10 Yuri Kushnarev, 11 Viktor Telnov, 12 Kirill Golosnitskiy, 13 Denis Semikov, 14 Khetag Dzobelov, 15 Gleb Farkov
Replacements: 16 Alexander Ivanov, 17 Valeri Morozov, 18 Anton Drozdov, 19 Bogdan Kireev, 20 Ivan Chepraga, 21 Denis Barabantsev, 22 Alexey Golov, 23 Pavel Kirillov
CHILE
1 Vittorio Lastra, 2 Tomás Dussaillant, 3 Matías Dittus, 4 Clemente Saavedra, 5 Augusto Sarmiento, 6 Martín Sigren (capt.), 7 Thomas Orchard, 8 Alfonso Escobar, 9 Marcelo Torrealba, 10 Rodrigo Fernández, 11 Pablo Casas, 12 José Larenas, 13 Domingo Saavedra, 14 Matías Garafulic, 15 Santiago Videla
Replacements: 16 Augusto Bohme, 17 Javier Carrasco, 18 Salvador Lues, 19 Santiago Pedrero, 20 Diego Escobar, 21 Raimundo Martínez, 22 Iñaki Ayarza, 23 Lukas Carvallo
Date: Friday, November 26, 2021
Kick-Off: 3pm (Local); 9:00am (Chile)
Venue: FGUP Yug-Sport, Sochi, Russia
Referee: Adam Jones (Wales)
Assistant Referees: Manuel Bottino (Italy); Chris Busby (Ireland)
TMO: Sean Brickell (Wales)
HISTORIC RESULTS
2021-11-20 – Russia 29, Chile 30 (Sochi, Russia)
2017-11-18 – Russia 42, Chile 11 (Hong Kong)
